


line without a hook.

by veravia



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Historical, Betrayal, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Letters, Love Letters, McCree is an outlaw, Past Relationship(s), Pining, Secret Relationship, and he is SMITTEN
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-25
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-15 16:47:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29686944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/veravia/pseuds/veravia
Summary: ‘McCree,’ she wrote along the top of the page, swirly black ink curling around the ‘e.’‘I have received your letter and I-’ She crumpled the paper up in her hands, leaving the ball in the corner of her desk. Too formal.‘McCree,’ she started again.‘It has been a week since your disappearance. I got your letter. Your words have left me-’ The paper crunched between her fingers, adding another failure to the pile.“Jesse,” She finally wrote.
Relationships: Jesse McCree & Reader, Jesse McCree/Female Reader, Jesse McCree/Reader
Comments: 2
Kudos: 17





	line without a hook.

**Author's Note:**

> hi!! this is my first fic with the cowboy and i love him very very much so i hope i captured his voice in the way i intended to :)

She liked the way Jesse McCree’s hands fell against her face. 

They were rough and calloused, cupping the edges of her cheeks as he pressed his lips to the sides of her temples. 

Their love was quiet—finding dark corners of long hallways and tiny closets, knocking over broomsticks and sneaking out with half-tied corsets. She carried her shoes between her fingers, the pads of her feet ripping up damp evening soil as they ran through the gardens, giggles catching the quiet air as mud swallowed the bottom of his trousers. 

He was messy. His hands would fly around her, orbiting her hair, her shoulders, her hips. He’d laugh too loudly, kiss too eagerly—leaving fleeting moments of arbitrary expressions of love. 

Jesse… McCree, as she’d often correct herself, was no good man. He had robbed, and killed, and taken things from people who needed them most—but when his hands, rough and calloused, cupped the edges of her cheeks, she liked the well they fell—haphazard and messy. 

“May I ask you something?” Her fingers were twiddling the grass beneath her, morning dew seeping through the wool of her skirt. 

They’d been lying there since the moon swallowed the sky, the light of the stars kissing their skin, and the embrace of the cosmos seeping into the soil. But the sun was beginning to rise along the horizon and the oranges of morning never seemed to feel like her color. 

“Mhm.” He toyed with her fingers, tracing the indents between her knuckles. His response left him in a low hum, but it was clear his attention had fizzled amongst the clouds of the morning sky. 

“Is it the thrill?” He perked up, shifting his head from the center of her lap so he could catch her face in his gaze. “The robbing, the killing. Is it a way to live? Or has it been the entertainment all along?” 

McCree sighed, dropping her hands from his grasp. 

“It ain’t that simple, sweetpea.” 

“Is it not? Do you find joy in taking from others?” Her words had bubbled into mindless wonder as they left her lips, not quite hardening into the interrogation she had hoped. 

“‘Course not. But you ain’t ever seen the world the way it is out there. It’s quiet here, darlin’, more than you’ll ever know.” The terms of endearment felt sticky as they left his mouth, leaving her nose to scrunch at the sound. 

“People are mean. They’re cruel and snide and take everything from everybody at any chance they get. And when you’re born into that, into somewhere that isn’t here, into someone that isn’t you, your choices are limited.” 

She hummed in reply, dropping her head into the grass below her. She didn’t understand, she  _ couldn’t  _ understand. At least not quite. 

The world that she lived in and the world that McCree lived in, they were infinitely different. He’d told her stories before—about how when she was being laced into gowns and made to attend galas, he was roaming empty streets, stealing from vendors who never seemed to pay enough attention to their stands just to eat. 

Her life, though filled with frivolous duties and monotonous gatherings, was quiet. She had never begged for food, nor shelter, nor… anything, really. Things were handed to her on a silver platter—and though McCree loved her, he couldn’t help but acknowledge the way she seemed to take them for granted. 

All remained still for a moment. The birds still sang the songs of the rising sun and the trees still swayed in their array of morning reds, but they laid stagnant in the grass, collecting the scent of wet soil against their skin. 

“I have to go.” He was quiet, sitting up from his spot slowly, planting his hands in the grass for leverage. 

“I know,” she murmured. “Will you come back tomorrow?”

McCree hummed, opting not to open his mouth. 

He did it then—planted his hands along the sides of her cheeks, placing a kiss at the bottom of her hairline. He was gentle and he was slow, as if he was holding porcelain between his fingers. It was nothing like him. Nothing like his messy stutters or roaming hands—but she didn’t seem to notice.

McCree did not return that night. Nor the night after, or the one after that. She wandered down to the fields as the moon claimed its spot in the center of the sky, but she was left to wait—soaking in an array of midnight blues without his hands, rough and calloused, or his words, always haphazard and rushed. 

She found the letter outside her door a week later. It was crumpled and stained (from his pockets if she had to guess), and as she flattened it out against her thigh she recognized his scratchy handwriting scrawled across the paper. 

‘ _ Sweetpea,’  _ she read out the first line under the glow of candlelight. She’d spent the day toying with the seal on the envelope, unsure whether she could handle the words that trailed the paper, unsure if she  _ wanted  _ to. 

‘ _ I was never much for writing letters, they always seemed too formal.  _

_ But I have to go away for a while. I’m not sure how long or how far but I can’t stay around here no more.  _

_ I wanted to tell you in the fields that morning, but I was a coward.  _

_ Try to be careful for me til I get back, even though we both know you won’t. _

_ Jesse’  _

That was it. Scratchy handwriting along creased paper and a heartless goodbye—or it at least, it felt like one. She couldn’t decide whether she wanted to tuck it away in the back of her desk drawer or crumple the paper between her fingers and throw it as far into the pond as she could. 

Instead, she opted to stare at it, reading the words over and over. His hands had been trailing fast as he wrote it, letters smeared from his skin pressing against the ink. She wished he would’ve told her, would’ve let her help him. She hadn’t decided  _ how  _ she could’ve done so, but she was sure she could have, somehow. 

The note sat in its spot on her desk as she brushed her hair that night, and as she wandered the halls, searching for some kind of solace in the quiet creaking of the floors, and finally as she laid in her bed. She stared up at the ceiling, watching as starlight danced across her field of view. Truthfully, her vision had glossed over minutes ago. Truthfully, she couldn’t seem to think of anything other than that damned letter. 

It was so short. His words were so plain. He was gone, and all he left was a crumpled piece of paper to hang ugly words around the light of her paraffin lamp. She’d never hated him more. 

The weather the next day was hot and sticky. The sky glowed a boisterous yellow—one much too loud for her taste—so when her father sent her to her room to continue her studies, she didn’t so much as open her mouth to complain. 

Admittedly, though, her books had been left stacked in the corner of her night table, her desk occupied by bright white sheets of paper and a pen she bobbed between her fingers. 

She felt the need to reply to the letter. She wasn’t sure why. There was no way he’d ever see it— no place to deliver it to, no hint to where he might have gone— but something about leaving it unanswered, as foolish as it was, left a pit in the bottom of her stomach. 

‘ _ McCree,’  _ she wrote along the top of the page, swirly black ink curling around the ‘ _ e.’ _

‘ _ I have received your letter and I-’  _ She crumpled the paper up in her hands, leaving the ball in the corner of her desk.  _ Too formal.  _

‘ _ McCree,’  _ she started again. 

‘ _ It has been a week since your disappearance. I got your letter. Your words have left me-’  _ The paper crunched between her fingers, adding another failure to the pile. 

“ _ Jesse,”  _ She finally wrote. The nib of her pen snagged the curve of the letters,  __ leaving a splotch of ink along the top of the page. She reached out to crumple it again but stopped herself. She at least had to wait for the ink to dry. 

_ ‘I have found myself stumbling over this letter for hours now. I wish I could be angry.  _

_ I should have known that this day would come. In a way, I believe I did. But in my ignorance, I refused to accept such an occurrence. I thought you belonged to me and only to me. Your promises of body and soul left me utterly smitten, and love makes you blind.  _

_ I am terrified that I wish for you to return. I have seen you appear below the balcony but to my dismay, you seem to be nothing more than an illusion. You are not under my balcony, Jesse, you are running from the law.  _

_ I was blind enough to grant my heart to a criminal, and for that perhaps I deserve this. But I am bewitched by the idea of seeing you once again, and I can never forgive you for giving me such pitiful hope.  _

_ Disgustingly, entirely yours—” _

She signed her name at the bottom of the page in delicate script. Her breath hitched as she placed the pen down on the desk, leaning into the back of her chair in relief. 

She promised herself that this was goodbye. That perhaps these words would leave her with enough closure that she could move on and forget about the man whose phantom lingered at her bedside. She knew better than to think that to be true. 

She was never one to ignore him. 

It was hot when they met. Willows hung low above the ground and the heat of the sun was enough to soak through thin strips of cloth that wrapped around her bodice. She draped herself over railings and balconies, begging for solace from the fiery sky. 

She was to spend her Summer, as she was all Summers, with her cousins in Georgia. They owned orchards with rows of peach trees that swallowed the horizon, but the fury of the Summer sky was enough to leave her wishing for the season to end already. 

It was only the middle of July, not even the peak of the coming heat, and she had already given up on leaving her room. There was nothing she could do—no reading or exploring or work on her studies. The sweltering air was relentless, and it seemed any sort of movement was far too much for her body’s expectations. 

The only thing she hated more than lying in the heat, was walking through town. 

The streets here were mud more often than not, and it was thick enough to coat the wagon wheels and cling to the edges of her shoes as she wandered from storefront to storefront. Her uncle never liked when she locked herself up in her room, so he’d send her on frivolous errands. Picking up flowers, or eggs, or strange tobacco products that she’d never once seen him use. It didn’t matter how inconsequential they seemed, anything that got her out of the house was good enough for him. 

As much as she attempted to keep each of her steps light, her feet seemed to drag through the mud. Wet dirt had found its way to every inch of her feet, right up to the bottom of her calves. She didn’t like this, hated it even, but with a mountain of products stacked in her arms, she didn’t have much of a choice. 

Then, a gunshot. 

She staggered, gripping the fruits of her errands tightly to her chest. Someone was shooting. People were screaming. She had to go. 

She was near enough to the wagon that her legs could propel her towards it, but the eggs had fallen from her arms, making a sickening  _ schlump  _ against the mud. Her ears rang as she ran and the streets echoed of gunfire. She pulled herself up into her seat and yelled for the driver to leave, but the wagon remained still. She received no reply. Hoisting herself over the back of the seats to glance at the front, her stomach churned. 

Her driver was slumped over in his seat, the fresh blood of a gunshot wound trailing from his temple to the corner of his mouth. She wanted to scream, to cry, to hide, but her lips quivered and she remained still, watching blood drip from the line of his jaw onto the leather seats. 

The man had worked for her uncle for as long as she could remember. When she was younger, he’d offer her neatly wrapped caramels from his pocket as she’d sit in the back, kicking her tiny legs back and forth. Suddenly, she hoped that the memory of her would be more than that—more than candy and wagon rides. 

Footsteps tore through the mud and her head whipped to the side to see a man approaching her. He raised his hands in the air at the sight of her, a revolver wound so tightly between his fingers that his knuckles had started to whiten. 

“Miss-” his voice barely cut through the screaming of gunfire. “Please miss I’m not gonna hurt ya, but you need to get outta here.” He continued to approach, his footsteps slow and steady. 

His face was coated in a layer of gunpowder and dirt, but clean strands of brown hair fell from the sides of his hat, dancing across his forehead. As he got closer, she began to back herself further and further into the wagon until her back was pressed so tightly against the wood that she was sure it would splinter. 

He reached a hand out to her—the one not clutching the gun—but his fingers were coated in syrupy reds, blood beginning the dry at the bottom of his wrist. It shimmered under the light of the afternoon sun and she couldn’t seem to move her eyes from the sight, her gaze following the way the blood smeared across his fingers. 

“I-” he quickly pulled away, brushing his hand against the side of his trousers. “I’m mighty sorry, I got into a bit of an altercation right back there—no guns involved, I promise.” 

“I-It’s,” her breath stuttered as she massaged her temples. She didn’t want to trust this man. She didn’t  _ want  _ to trust anyone—but she was quick to realize if she stayed there she was guaranteed to die, so maybe she simply didn’t have much of a choice. “fine sir, it’s fine.” 

_ ‘Jesse,’  _ She found herself writing to him again a week after her first attempt. The last letter still sat mockingly in the corner of her desk—the blot of ink still splattered across the front—but there was some sort of comfort she found in having it there. One that allowed her to hope that maybe he would read it one day. Or maybe a hope that he wouldn’t. 

‘ _ It’s raining again today. The wistful downpours that you have always adorned. The world feels empty without you here. The spirit that haunts my bedside seems to appear more and more infrequently with the passing days, and with each one I cannot help but think it might stop coming at all.’ _

_ In a way, I hope that’s the case.’  _ She signed her name under her words again in the same delicate script as before. She felt no need to say more. He didn’t deserve to hear more. 

The rain hadn’t stopped in the last few days, leaving her bound to her room—even more so than she had been before. It was soft against her window sills, spilling in from the open doors of her balcony. She’d welcomed it—the dampening breeze, the droplets that caught her floors, the swaying of her curtains. Anything was better than that damned heat. 

She curled her fingers around the edges of the new letter, mindful of the drying ink, and lined it up with the last, growing the pile in the corner of her desk. She’d never been very good at goodbye. 

Her eyes caught the swaying trees outside her window and she rose from her seat, approaching the balcony. The world seemed to stand still when it rained. There was no way to work in the fields, or allow the animals outdoors, or to do anything besides observe the open sky. Thunder cracked across the field and suddenly it swirled into a downpour, each droplet hitting the ground harder than the last. 

She stepped out into the rain then. Water swallowed her, seeping through her dress, slowly soaking into the deepest parts of her flesh. She shivered under the chill of the thundering sky, but there was something oddly freeing about it. 

With rain, the world was anew. The evidence of what is—what once  _ was _ —was washed away, dripping down from the roof to the blades of grass that stretched below her. This was it. This was the moment she could scream for reclamation. The moment she could let all evidence of Jesse McCree bleed from her throat. 

So she stood against the railing and she screamed. She screamed until her vocal cords began to ache, until she was so loud that the rain couldn’t contain her noise, until all evidence of  _ Jesse McCree  _ was purged from her body. 

_ Free, _ was all she thought as she stumbled through the balcony doors, trailing rain droplets behind her. 

Free, she claimed she would be. 

  
  
  
  
  



End file.
